It’s hard to believe
that a major work by Gustav Holst is only now receiving its London première
but The Coming of Christ
seems not to have been given since its first performances at Canterbury
Cathedral in 1927. The Very Rev George Bell was Dean of Canterbury Cathedral
from 1925 to 1929, founded the Canterbury Festival and wanted to revive the
mediaeval tradition of religious dramas which led him to invite John Masefield
– soon to become Poet Laureate – and Holst to create The Coming of Christ,
a play with incidental music. What we had tonight was a performance of Holst’s
complete score – about 24 minutes in duration – with a linking narration,
adapted by Fern Dickson, based on Masefield’s text.

Scored for soloists, chorus and a small orchestra of strings, trumpet, organ
and piano, this is Holst moving towards the simplified style he sought towards
the end of his life, and which he achieved, with such epic effortlessness, in
his masterpiece Egdon
Heath, and the Humbert Wolfe Songs.
Certainly the short pieces which make up this work are terse and to the point,
not a note is wasted, and he conveys the urgency and grandeur of the event
with the simplest of gestures and language. Quite why this work has languished
in obscurity for so long is a mystery to me for it is very approachable and
makes an appealing addition to the few great works which are heard every
Christmas. The City of London Choir did Holst proud tonight, with their
vibrant advocacy which conveyed their obvious delight in the music. It’s
always difficult finding exactly the right voice for a speaking part, in a
musical work, but the choice of Timothy Bentinck (12th
Earl of Portland, 8th Count Bentinck und Waldeck Limpurg, David Archer in the
BBC Radio 4 serial The Archers
and the voice of “Mind the Gap” on London Underground’s Piccadilly Line) was
an inspired one and he proved to be perfect – his quiet authority being most
welcome in the storytelling. Overall, this was an occasion to be relished and
the City of London
Choir is to be applauded – as it was, for over 2 minutes! – for giving us this
opportunity to hear this wonderful music. It was preceded by Stephen FarrplayingJ S Bach’sChorale-Prelude In dulci
jubilo,
as requested by Holst.

The neglect of Holst’s
earlier Two Psalms
is equally mystifying. These delicate, unpretentious, settings, for chorus
with organ and strings, are full of good things and show Holst at his best;
writing music of praise which is a joy both to sing and to hear. The first is
mystical and the second exuberant, and the choir responded to both with, by
turns, singing of quiet ecstasy and jubilant exuberance. In both Holst works
soloists from the chorus gave solid and distinguished performances.

There are some who believe that Benjamin Britten was a bit too clever for his
own good – a machine who could turn out music like a cow giving milk.
Certainly he had a facility which allowed him to know just how to write a
piece and when it would be ready – I remember hearing Imogen Holst say that on
the first day of composition of an opera he announced that Act 1 would be
completed on a certain date, and it was! – and occasionally one feels that he
is simply going through the motions of composition rather than actually
composing. St Nicholas
is, I feel, an example of Britten doing what he could without really engaging
his musical brain, but it is a piece which works well in performance, and is
pleasing and rewarding to perform, but there’s too little real music in the
piece, and far too much banality – The Birth of Nicholas,
He journeys to Palestine
and Nicholas and the
Pickled Boys being
especially cringe–inducing. If only Britten had built on the strengths of the
opening movement, with its angular, and tortured, violin line, we might have
had a better work, rather than a piece of rather negligible Gebrauchsmusik.
Using all the forces in the hall, the four trebles, as the baby Nicholas and
the Pickled Boys were excellent, the small, but significant, contribution from
the St Paul’s Girls School Chamber Choir, placed in the gallery, was most
welcome, and with Justin Lavender a fine soloist, totally in command of the
music, and delivering a muscular and insightful account of his part – it’s
good that we have now reached a point where it’s not obligatory for tenors
singing Britten’s music to sound like Peter Pears – Davan Wetton directed a
fine performance which raised the work onto a higher plain than that on which
it actually resides.

But the evening was most memorable for the fine singing of the City of London
Choir, and full praise to them and their director Hilary Davan Wetton for such
an inspired programme.
Bob Briggs